[Brother Captain Tom]

Hey everyone just thought I would make a thread where nilla players could receive tips on how to defeat space wolves or hold their own. The only army I have lost to so far are wolves. They are the same as marines only kings of CC! Maybe some wolf players could help me and other marine players out and give some tips. Also maybe some Nilla marines could throw in some good tactics/tips to assist with fighting wolves. Well thanks to everyone with tips and suggestions.

 

[buckero0]

shoot them. They have the same failings as regular marines. SM have better long distance shooting, better heavy vehicles, but as you already mentioned, they have a lot of the same stuff. SW die to things that shoot them. They die to things that don't allow saves, they die to having to take so many saves that they can't possibly make them all.

 

[Diggums Hammer]

Wolves are tough, as they are cheaper and better equipped for a short range battle.

They key is to keep them at distance. Make sure you target Rhino's and other Transports first. Be ready for counter attacks and Scouts coming off the edges.

 

[==Me==]

Vanilla Marines still have the best point for point combat unit in the game: TH/SS Termies. Jam those down anybody's throat and they will have a hard time dislodging them.

Other than that, SW are just like marines, only more focused on HtH and lacking critical things like Sternguard, cheap TH/SS, heavy weapons in Troop squads, and fun FOC swaps for Bikes and Dreads.

 

[jy2]

You definitely need psychic defense. The average librarian won't cut it with his 24"-only psychic hood. His Rune Priests will just use their unlimited range living lightnings. I'd recommend an ally - a Grey Knight Brother-Captian with unlimited-range psychic hoods or a Inquisitor Lord w/shooty retinue + psychic hood.

Otherwise, I'd say to make use of 2 superior units that you have that the wolves don't - TH/SS assault termies and sternguards.

 

[Brother Captain Tom]

I agree that you have to keep wolves at bay, but they will still get to you. Even with assault termis your looking at around 20 to 30 attacks on the charge. I dont do the whole math gaming thing, but that is alot of saves to be taking. The guy that I mainly play against wolf wise always uses a LRC, 2 ten man dev squads, a DP, two full wolf puppy squads (whatever they are called), also two of the CC wolve tac squads or whatever they are called, and a 5 man scout squad as extra help/objective taker. The only tactic I haven't tried against wolves is keep my force really tight together I mainly try to use two ranks one to hold ground and the second to flank. Love all the ideas getting passed around! Good tips/advice. Hopefully this thread will help a lot of marines like me who are having trouble with the wolves. Forgot to add that he takes a couple of IC's like a ruin priest and some named guy that does like wind for deepstriking and what have you.

 

[Sancraer]

I've never played against space wolves before but I have played cc armies.
I once used a two line shooting army that was very succesful. You make your standard shooting line and then as they get close you move back about half your men, (mainly your shooty ones), take the charge on front and then next turn you have another turn of shooting, it just stagger shtings a bit. Artillery works well with this as they can already be behind your original shooting line.
Thats my attempt at input.

 

[Sabe]

I agree that you have to keep wolves at bay, but they will still get to you. Even with assault termis your looking at around 20 to 30 attacks on the charge. I dont do the whole math gaming thing, but that is alot of saves to be taking. The guy that I mainly play against wolf wise always uses a LRC, 2 ten man dev squads, a DP, two full wolf puppy squads (whatever they are called), also two of the CC wolve tac squads or whatever they are called, and a 5 man scout squad as extra help/objective taker. The only tactic I haven't tried against wolves is keep my force really tight together I mainly try to use two ranks one to hold ground and the second to flank. Love all the ideas getting passed around! Good tips/advice. Hopefully this thread will help a lot of marines like me who are having trouble with the wolves. Forgot to add that he takes a couple of IC's like a ruin priest and some named guy that does like wind for deepstriking and what have you.

Um....he's cheating you left, right and center....

SW Long Fang packs can't get to 10 men, max 5 Long fangs and a pack leader, and everyone except the pack leader HAS to have a heavy weapon.

Wolf Scouts are elites...they can't claim objectives.

And since he's taken the above liberties I can only guess that he's probably slipping some wargear under the radar/misinterpreting his own rules(in his favor).

 

[MC Bone Giant]

Sabe pointed out several important points about the SW army. Be sure to make sure his lists are accurate and he's not taking liberties with the list. (have him show you his list and codex and check the math. Also pay attention to number of special weapons in squads. They are somewhat limited)

What have you generally been fielding against his wolves? We can give you all sorts of advice, but if you are just working with 2 dreads and some Tac squads, we would have to offer you different strategies than if you were rolling with a dual LR with Assault Termies list. There are options that you may not currently have but that could potentially work. For example, dual vindicators could do a pretty good job at punching holes in the Wolves. (also works well against 'nilla marines). But tactics also play a part. (if you were to leave your vindi's out unsupported, they could get chewed up in CC. Or, you could get them in range initially, and move them back 6" every turn to get an extra 1-2 turns of insta-killing marines)

Your best bet for fighting against Wolves (and 'nilla marines and other armies) is target priority and concentration of fire. Killing the transports will limit their mobility. Then you need to apply your firepower judiciously. Focus your fire to take down the squads charging at you. By the time they get there, hopefully you have units poised for the counter charge or to open up on the squad when they mow down the speedbump. Also realize that because of counterattack, you may be better off to get that extra round of rapid fire into that squad that's charging you. They will most likely get their charge bonus either way, might as well try to throw a couple more wounds on them. Know what your objectives for the mission are and follow your plan to accomplish them.

Sorry, Tangent here...Overall, I think SWs are slightly stronger in general than 'nilla marines. Sure, they don't have sternguard (wolf guard are comparable, but with different tricks) or TH/SS termies (SW have them, just more expensive) or the Iron Clad Dred (Sigh, what a shame.) But they are generally stronger in assault and they have a viable and versatile heavy weapons option with the Long Fangs. (cheap too) The Rune Priests are also very mean and can ruin a lot of people's days.

 

[Brother Captain Tom]

Good points! Ill have to look into his list and go through the wolf codex. The scouts I know cant claim objectives, but he uses them to contest, or to at least try to keep me at bay from grabbing or contesting (they are easy enough to deal with though). The problem I have is he uses the two full wolf squads or whatever their dogs are. He keeps them exactly two inches apart so blast templates are horrible against them. Then on top of that he has two 10 man cc squads and keeps one in a LRC. Usually I can pop the LRC on turn 1, but sometimes the die rolls just are not with me. Anyways here is what I have been using against them, but did make some changes recently due to under performance and ill add what I changed at the end.

HQ-Chaplain-TermiArmour,StormBolter (and basic Chap gear)
HQ-Marneus-BasicGear (use him for OB since I dont have a cheap chapter master model and I only play WYSIWYG, and he is fairly descent in CC)

Troop- 4 x Tactical ten man squads (all with bolters,ML,Flamer) one squad has a MG and ML

Elite- Dread-Assault Cannon, CCW with StormBolter
Elite- Dread-MultiMelta, CCW with StormBolter
Elite- Termi's x 10 SB,AC,CML,PW,PF,CF (dont have assault termi's but definatly picking some up next payday. Normal termi's arent cutting it)

FastAttack- Assault x 5-PF,CombatShield,BP,CS

Heavy-Predator (usually I do all LC, but thinking about adjusting to Heavy Bolters on the sides)

Rhino-SB Xtra Armour
DP-SB, Locator Beacon (or teleport homer cant think right now im at work, but its whatever one allows no scatter if models deepstrike within 6 inches)

Ok changes- Termi's are way under performing dropped 5 of them and kept the CML and Chainfists, Added a full Dev squad with each weapon (probably a dumb idea but it makes it so I can deal with whatever), and a full tac squad with MG,ML.

Hoping to drop all the termis and just throw in assault termi's instead and for the last few points im putting two more DP in the mix, or maybe two razorbacks. All this is until I can afford to buy a LRC which wont happen till after Christmas (kids are expensive to buy presents for!)

Oh and for everyone to know we run 2k games. Also I would love to hear what other people run when they face wolves, on different point scales, every little bit of information im sure will help everyone who reads this thread! Thanks for all the great tips/posts so far.

Sorry the points may be a little off or I may have forgotten something I dont have my list on me right now im sitting at work ;-(. I plan on upgrading my army big time after Christmas blows through. I also have a three man bike squad not put together yet.

 

[antique_nova]

2000 points? beware of jaws of the world wolf, they can squash your charactesr in any one turn. even if your guys need to roll 6s. it's like a terminator only needing to roll a 1 to die to non AP firepower. Also watch out for booby traps when he uses THs against your characters to bring them down to Iniative one and then Jottw. Also rmember ARJAC's thunder hammer throw DOES NOT use the thunder hammer profile.

Beware of mark of the wulfen. it's 1+D6 ( plus rending ) do not underestimate it or wolf standards where they let the unt re-roll ones only in the ASSUALT PHASE.

TWC can be baited like any other cavalry unit, but they are too not to be underestimated. Be careful of not sending cheap units to anything with the saga of the warrior born or that figure will mount up with a stupid number of attacks.

They can also be easily broken like any other marine army. concentrate on one area of their army and it will break and fall under weight of firepower or man power in close combat.

thanks
antique_nova

 

[jy2]

Also watch out for booby traps when he uses THs against your characters to bring them down to Iniative one and then Jottw. Also rmember ARJAC's thunder hammer throw DOES NOT use the thunder hammer profile.

I'd have to disagree with the TH making them test on I1 with Jaws. You use the base init, not the modified init. Otherwise, jaws would be the bane of powerfist/TH termies everywhere, or units attacking through cover.

 

[antique_nova]

are you sure? i need to check the codex. a model with a TH or PF only strikes at Initiative one.; at all other times his initiative remains its basic value until he strikes with the weapon that modifies his stats.
thanks
antique_nova

 

[BossGorestompa]

I believe what antique_nova meant (even though he didn't mention it in his reply??) was the opponent's use of TH to reduce your Eternal Warrior characters to Init 1, followed by JOTWW.

 

[Takeda]

I don't think he meant the wielders of powerfists and thunderhammers having to take the test at initiative 1.

I think he meant using one of his own models' TH to wound, thus reducing an enemy model's initiative to 1, and then using the Jaws power to force a test at that reduced initiative of 1.

in the rulebook on p42, there is a description of a thunderhammer's effects
-it DOES NOT say the wounded enemy model now strikes at initiative 1
-it DOES say the wounded enemy model actually has its initiative reduced to 1 until the end of the next player's turn.

given that the enemy model is not just having to strike at initiative 1, but in fact has that character stat explicitly reduced, they would be having to act in any capacity with initiative until the end of the next player's turn.

p8 has the description for characteristic tests. modifiers are ignored in the case of rolling 6 for auto fail and 1 for auto pass. doesn't say anything about all other cases in regards to modifiers

I wasn't too sure about this to begin with, but in writing this message, now that i've gone through and looked up the rulebook, it seems to be the case that the TH and JOTWW combination works.

i see that there could be room for contention on this, but based on the wording of all the rules concerned, for it to work is currently more logical and plausible than for it not to work.

sorry of this is off topic

as for marines, deal with grey hunters like you would chaos space marines - they are now quite similar. as for bloodclaws, they are like cheaper and crappier khorne berzerkers - better to get the charge on them then for them to get the charge on you. and like other people have said, capitalize on what you have that wolves don't

 

[==Me==]

HQ-Chaplain-TermiArmour,StormBolter (and basic Chap gear)
HQ-Marneus-BasicGear (use him for OB since I dont have a cheap chapter master model and I only play WYSIWYG, and he is fairly descent in CC)

Troop- 4 x Tactical ten man squads (all with bolters,ML,Flamer) one squad has a MG and ML

Elite- Dread-Assault Cannon, CCW with StormBolter
Elite- Dread-MultiMelta, CCW with StormBolter
Elite- Termi's x 10 SB,AC,CML,PW,PF,CF (dont have assault termi's but definatly picking some up next payday. Normal termi's arent cutting it)

FastAttack- Assault x 5-PF,CombatShield,BP,CS

Heavy-Predator (usually I do all LC, but thinking about adjusting to Heavy Bolters on the sides)

Rhino-SB Xtra Armour
DP-SB, Locator Beacon (or teleport homer cant think right now im at work, but its whatever one allows no scatter if models deepstrike within 6 inches)

Ugh, made ==My== head hurt.

You can lose Marneus, he is too expensive and isn't offering you anything. Chappy isn't doing a whole lot either. A Libby is the best bargain HQ you can field, stops enemy psykers and dishes out fun stuff like Null Zone.

Tacticals on foot...fail. They need to be mounted. You can also lose 1 and be fine. Cheap scorers with flexible weaponry (multi-melta and flamer, busts tanks and roasts hordes).

1 Dread is a threat, the AssCan not so much. Look into dual TLACs, they're great for busting up armor and throwing down high S, accurate fire at 48". Otherwise, MM/HF is a nice cheap variant.

Normal Termies kinda are meh. If you want 'em, just take cyclones. Combat squad and provide firepower as you advance.

Assault Squads suck, don't bother.

Lascannons are too pricey and not very effective. You can field 2 AC/HB Preds for cheaper (cheap, lots of medium S fire to nail infantry or light armor).

Extra armor isn't so useful on a Rhino, just too expensive. Get like 3-4 more.

Drop Pods are good for Dreads and Sternguard, but they're ultimately a throwaway unit when podding.

Needs a lot of work, it's just a very poor gunline at present.